Madame Foxx, XXXing Out Your Concerns

One of Virginia Foxx's constituents wrote her an e-mail about the federal budget moving through the Republican House, and this is the reply he got (and I promise I'm not making up any of this, including all those Xs):

"Thank you for contacting me with your concerns about XXXXXXX funding in the FY 2007 Budget. Each year the President submits his budget recommendations to Congress, which maintains 'the power of the purse' and sets final funding levels for the federal government. The recommendations made by the President are not automatically accepted by Congress and both the House and Senate must agree on final funding levels before they are enacted .... It is important to explain the predicament we are in because like XXXXXXXX, there are many popular programs that Congress must meticulously examine when setting responsible funding priorities."

Meaning? Any funding YOU'RE interested in, Dearest Voter, is just XXXXX to The Madam. You name it ... XXXXX. "I couldn't care less, meticulously."

Our favorite paragraph, which rings the gong of The Madam's metal heart:

"The federal government currently has a deficit resulting from overspending that must be dealt with promptly. If prompt action is not taken, the federal government will have to raise your taxes to meet promises made through the Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid programs; just meeting the costs of those programs will consume 70% of federal dollars by 2040, leaving only 30% for national defense and all other programs now receiving federal dollars. For that reason, I support the Republican Study Committee's (RSC) budget proposal which eliminates or reduces spending on programs that are not federal priorities and addresses our budget deficit. Enclosed you will find an article from the Heritage Foundation about the RSC budget and the effects of spending irresponsibly."

No XXXXXXXs there, but plenty of unanswered questions and unexamined assumptions:

1. No mention of where that whopping deficit came from.
2. Notice the snide swipe at gol-darn "promises made through Social Security"! She can't wait to phase THOSE out.
3. "Federal priorities"? According to whom? The Republican Study Committee, the Star Chamber of the House's most conservative members, people who are always afraid that feeding the poor will only spoil their character, while they personally look for every route around the law for themselves and their rich friends.